Insurance Should Cover This -- November 16, 2020

Global warming modeling did not forecast this.  

For the most part, the winds were calm.

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A Musical Interlude

I'm heading to bed. It's only 9:08 p.m. local time, but ti's been a long day. Emotionally.

Sophia and I have so much fun together. 

Earlier today her reading teacher was teaching her a new concept which I did not understand.

On the way home, I went over the concept with Sophia as I heard Ms Davis teach it, hoping Sophia could explain it to me. I asked Sophia, six years old, if she understood the concept. There was a pause, then, "Technically, no."

Technically? LOL.

Well, I guess she understood the concept better than I. I did not even understand it non-technically. LOL.

Anyway, I'm sitting her, watching Roy Orbison, "Black And White Night." Wow. So many great singers, but it seems so much goes back to Willie Nelson and Roy Orbison. 

Pretty Woman, Roy Orbison

Saudi Arabia To Issue Dollar-Denominated Bonds To Meet Obligations -- Particularly That Annual $75 Billion Dividend -- November 16, 2020

At one time Saudi Arabia (and Russia) threatened to "de-link" Mideast petro dollars (i.e., riyals and rubles) and US dollars. Now, Saudi Arabia is in such dire straits, the kingdom has announced it will issue US-dollar-denominated bonds to make ends meet. From The WSJ, a story easily found everywhere:

Saudi Aramco said Monday it aims to issue a U.S. dollar-denominated bond, as the cash-strapped oil giant cuts jobs, considers asset sales and reviews its expansion plans.

Saudi Arabian Oil Co., as the company is officially called, is selling debt even as low oil prices hurt its ability to generate cash for its biggest shareholder, the Saudi government. It is seeking to meet a pledge made last year to pay $75 billion in annual dividends.

Aramco in a statement said it hired Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Inc., Citi, JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley, among others, to arrange investor calls on Monday ahead of a debt sale. The oil company, which didn’t disclose pricing or how much it will raise, said it plans a multi-tranche bond offering with potential maturities of three, five, 10, 30 and 50 years. The bond issue is likely to raise billions of dollars, and the pricing and size would depend on market conditions, Aramco added.

Saudi is one  of the most strict countries when it comes to following the Koran. 

From the internets:

To charge interest from someone who is forced to borrow to meet his essential consumption requirement is considered as an exploitative practice in Islam.

Charging of interest on loans for productive purposes is also prohibited because it is not an equitable form of transaction.

When It Comes To Tabulating DUCs, There Seems To Be A Disconnect Between What Writers Write And What The Data Shows -- November 16, 2020

A reader provided a spreadsheet of all the major shale plays in the US with the number of drilled wells, completed wells, and DUCs.

The reader tells us how to access this data (see first comment):

The historical DUC spreadsheet from the EIA is linked on the sidebar of the monthly drilling productivity report, with the Excel file titled "DUC data (aggregated by region)"
https://www.eia.gov/petroleum/drilling/

He noted the same issue I've noted. The data itself does not reflect what is being reported. 

He noted this:

I keep seeing these reports like the oilprice one from last month we discussed.

Oil operators get DUCs in a row, adding fracking crews to boost output - US frackers are bringing back equipment even as oil prices languish around $40 a barrel in a bid to boost production and tap into a backlog of drilled wells left uncompleted (DUCs) when oil prices crashed earlier this year.The number of active hydraulic fracturing fleets has climbed by nearly 50% since mid-September to 127, according to data from consultancy Primary Vision, outpacing a roughly 17% jump in the number of active drilling rigs over that same period of time.

Do these people know something the EIA doesn't, or is it all just based on scuttlebutt?

I posted the data below for the Bakken. There was just too much to post for all major US shale plays but it was all similar. We're not seeing DUCs being completed any faster now than they were being completed in the past. 

 

In fact, for the Bakken, the number of DUCs are fairly stable, if anything increasing, rather than decreasing as some would suggest.  The reader supplied data for all months in the years noted below. I only provided the January / December in each of the years. Note the gap between 2014 and 2017. 

I have tracked North Dakota DUCs since May, 2016, and that data is posted at this site.

Bakken	Drilled	Completed	DUCs
Jan 14	178	143	605
Dec 14	226	194	737
Jan 17	63	52	811
Dec 17	78	65	773
Jan 18	107	72	808
Dec 18	109	70	792
Jan 19	121	71	842
Dec 19	95	86	884
Jan 20	100	94	890
Mar 20	95	106	876
Jul 20	18	25	891
Oct 20	19	32	851

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Here's The Permian Data
Spoiler Alert: Same Story

Permian	Drilled	Completed	DUCs
Jan 14	581	590	650
Dec 14	634	577	1041
Jan 17	352	259	1297
Dec 17	473	382	2034
Jan 18	487	403	2118
Dec 18	537	416	2937
Jan 19	585	476	3046
Dec 19	449	453	3417
Jan 20	449	438	3428
Mar 20	462	442	3470
Jul 20	149	101	3586
Oct 20	141	156	3565

Notes From All Over -- November 16, 2020

There's not enough news to justify another blog entry this early, but ..... I'm curious .... what are futures doing? Is there a chance the Dow will go over 30,000 tomorrow? Let's see where futures stand tonight. Generally, the 6:00 p.m. futures reflect the earlier closing action and don't reflect the trading for the next day. That we won't see until about 6:00 a.m. tomorrow.

But let's check: CNBC futures, 6:35 p.m. ET:

• Dow: pretty much flat; up less than five points
• S&P mini: ditto
• NASDAQ: up about 68 points
  

Over at CNN Business, 6:37 p.m. ET:

• Down: flat at 0.0000 change
• S&P: up 2 points, i.e., flat
• NASDAQ: up 57 points

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site.  Do not make any investment, financial, job, career, travel, or relationship decisions based on what you read here or think you may have read here.  

My two cents: for those who have held shares in publicly traded energy companies through this debacle over the past four years, now is not the time to sell. I wouldn't recommend buying any energy shares right now except in peculiar situations, but I wouldn't recommend selling if you held out this long hoping for a turnaroud -- I guess that makes my general recommendation for energy shares, a hold. 

Repeating: this is not an investment site.  Do not make any investment, financial, job, career, travel, or relationship decisions based on what you read here or think you may have read here.

In A Week Or So, Students Will Be Leaving Universities, Colleges For The Rest of 2020 -- Sports Commentator -- November 16, 2020

On a sports talk show it was just said that students will not be returning to their colleges or universities after the Thanksgiving break. One exception: the basketball players. The athlete-students will be coming back and the 2020 - 2021 college basketball season will be played. The commentator said there is just too much money in college basketball to give any thought to college basketball not being played this season.  

The big question, will students come back in 2021?

As Alice Cooper said, "school's out for Covid, school's out forever."

School's Out, Alice Cooper

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Chinese Flu Watch

Deaths / per capita, link here, set filter to "yesterday."

North Dakota continues to rank 9th where it has been for quite some time. The state is unlikely to move any higher for awhile, if ever.

South Dakota, however, has moved from 23rd (recently) to 19th today. South Daota should have no trouble moving up the list, getting ever closer to herd immunity.